No prizes for guessing what the “inescapable social truth” is at Stills and CCA this month. Given that it’s money, this is a timely show for the beleaguered sector and its public. Jeremy Deller, Tracey Emin and Andreas Gursky are among some 40 artists represented.

22 more artists line up for a show about light. Expect a demo of the medium’s propensity to stimulate, together with proof that the earliest experiments in luminous art still do the trick. Good chance to see the likes of trailblazer Dan Flavin, along with fresh talent Katie Paterson.

Best known for selling his now proverbial pile of bricks to the Tate, this sculptor is less well known for once hoping to be the ‘Turner of matter’. Visitors to the English painter’s eponymous gallery can decide for themselves if Andre succeeds in wresting materials from representation.

Michael Landy: Four Walls, , February 9 – June 16

It is almost ten years since Landy installed a replica of his housebound father’s house at Tate Britain. So this is a good chance to revisit part of that show and look at the old man’s collection of DIY manuals while listening to a soundtrack of him whistling his favourite tunes.

The Bride and the Bachelors: Duchamp with Cage, Cunningham, Rauschenberg and Johns, Barbican, London, February 14 –June 9

This month two shows are curated by an artist, here Philippe Parreno. But Duchamp’s influence is so far-reaching that the Barbican have let the results spill over into dance, theatre, talks and even cabaret. That’s not to mention his effect on Pop artists Rauschenberg and Johns.

While decades younger, Shaw is equally hard to contain. His fantastical flora and fauna festoon much of the Gallery and defy easy pigeonholing. See how he has responded to a painting by Stubbs, and romantics should keep eyes peeled for Valentine’s event in said space.

The Universal Addressability of Dumb Things – an exhibition curated by Mark Leckey, the Bluecoat, Liverpool, February 16 – April 14

A touring show with major thrust opens in Liverpool. Turner Prize-winner Leckey contends that with the rise of new technologies must come a return of atavistic tendencies towards animism. Artworks old and new are presented alongside artefacts to bring this idea to startling life.